


Not Actually All That Unexpected

by rocketpool



Series: Nerd Love [6]
Category: Leverage, The Hobbit (2012)
Genre: Also mentions The Silmarillion, Fluff, I blame Neierathima, M/M, Not a Crossover, The Hobbit is referenced as a movie, because Hardison is the adorkablest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-01-01
Packaged: 2017-12-05 06:15:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/719810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rocketpool/pseuds/rocketpool
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hardison knows the story inside and out, but Eliot's the one that knows the tune. (Or, Nerd Love: The Hobbit Edition)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Actually All That Unexpected

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elebridith](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elebridith/gifts).



> I blame Nei, not just for the core idea, but the timing of when I watched The Hobbit as well. For my dearest Ele, as the latest present ever. (... Okay, not _ever_.) My thanks to Sarah and Lisa for the read through/beta. Any remaining mistakes are 100% mine. There's also a few geeky references sprinkled in which are in no way mine.

Eliot already knows that half the words coming out of Hardison's mouth are not English. It pains him to acknowledge that he does, in fact, know that some of the words are in a dialect of elvish, and furthermore, that there are two such dialects. He knows that there's a thing called koozduul, or something that _sounds_ like koozduul, which may or may not be associated to a dale or something, but fuck if he knows what it is exactly. (Never mind Istari, Durin, and a number of ages that don't actually seem to go in order.) Hardison hasn't actually slowed down enough for Eliot to ask.

“-- literally, man, literally, the Vala Aulëa crafted them, their whole language man, and against all rules of linguistics, it never changed, not in the whole history of --”

Eliot lets the words slide over him, trying not to consciously catch them and just letting them stream into his personal collection of “how to fake being a nerd”. He just keeps on with sharpening his knife blanks. He'd special ordered the hammer forged, white paper steel blanks from an artisan in Echizen, Japan, an honor he'd only been given because he had, for a short time, apprenticed under another master smithy in the same co-op. Sure, he would never be worthy of folding and hammering the steel himself, but they knew he understood his reverence and skill with a blade, with grinding and sharpening. They knew he understood the zen of this work.

Meanwhile, Hardison is ostensibly working on a new gizmo-ma-bob (Parker's word) that he wants to try out on the next job. Eliot knows the kid can talk and work at the same time, not that it hadn't taken a year for Eliot to figure it out at first. But this time Hardison has stopped poking at the screws and wiring and waives one of his tools for emphasis as he babbles on.

This might even beat _Doctor Who_ , and Eliot hadn't thought that was actually fucking possible.

Eliot is, however, smart enough to realize what it is that got his boy digging into his endless mind palace of dorkitude. He's also smart enough to do a little research on his own, because he does like to make Hardison happy, but he is _not_ going to see a three hour long movie.

So he lets Hardison carry on a little longer (something about dragons and a necromancer, which at least sounds like the synopsis Eliot read somewhere), and then starts to hum. Softly, at first, because Hardison has learned that Eliot can listen and hum and do three other things besides without missing a thing. Hardison isn't paying attention, not yet, so as Eliot carries on, he starts to hum a little more loudly, keeping track of the verses in his head, because it isn't as though there was more than a sound-clip available, and it sure as hell didn't cover as many verses as he found.

He works sharpening the knife blanks into the rhythm, letting the sound of metal on stone keep his time. Eliot can tell that Hardison is starting to pay attention, words slowing, head tipped like he's trying to figure out what it is he's missing. Elliot’s got him on the hook, so he gives in to the song and lets everything else fade from his attention. There are only the notes, timed breaths, only the stroke of stone on folded metal, the scrape and grind smoothing, shaping, sharpening the blank and his mind. He feels the words more than thinking them, and lets them loose with the same timed precision, the same careful zen.

“Far over the Misty Mountains cold, To dungeons deep and caverns old, We must away, ere break of day, To seek our pale enchanted gold.” Eliot lets the words roll out of him like waves, building and ebbing, carving out a tale of mines and gold, fire. It reminds him a little of when he memorized a passage from _Beowulf_ in high school – for a girl, of course – grand and mythic. “They fled their hall to dying fall, Beneath his feet, beneath the moon. Far over the misty mountains grim, To dungeons deep and caverns dim, We must away, ere break of day, To win our harps and gold from him...”

The song ends, and all that's left is the sound of the blank against the sharpening stone. Eliot can tell that Hardison is staring at him, but he doesn't stop what he's doing. He doesn't even look at Hardison. He just waits.

“What were you just singing?” Hardison finally asks. The kid's waiting for a tell, some sign that Eliot is playing him, or that he's delusional. Eliot could probably bluff, and sell it as an old Norse or Finnish song or something, and Hardison would buy it, at least for a little while.

He plays the oblivious card instead. “Hm?”

“What. Were. You.... Y'know what, no. I know what you were singing. Nuh-uh. Me sitting here babbling like you don't know shit about the Valar and the line of Durin and here you are. Singing. Over. The. Fucking. Misty. Mountains. Cold.”

“Is that what it's called?”

Hardison makes a noise that's somewhere between indignation and pleasure. He's moving like he wants to say something else, standing now, hands sort of flailing, his face contorting into amusing expressions as more than one sentence fights to get out of his mouth at the same time. Eliot does love making him flustered.

It must show on his face because Hardison makes another one of those noises. Alec gets closer, less flaily but not exactly making words yet. “You...”

“Hm?” Eliot smirks as he continues his work.

“ _You_.” Hardison gets a couple of steps closer.

“Yes?”

Hardison points at him. “Did you really learn to sing a song for a thing you don't even know about?”

Eliot pulls his most innocent looking face, eyebrows raised. “Would I do that? C'mon man.”

Hardison stares at him for a moment. “Yeah, ok. Sure, sure. But you're gonna need to put the weaponry down cos I am not going to touch you while you're doin' that. Besides, the spare room has better acoustics.”


End file.
